Day 28

We’re almost at the finish line for our 30 Days of Sociology—and before we conclude, here’s one last look at what we found when we asked Fargo-Moorhead high schoolers about their musical tastes.

First, as discussed in Day 23, there’s still no single artist leading the pack. Even Drake—the most mentioned—only showed up eight times in our responses.

When it comes to genre preferences, it depends on where you go. Davies and Fargo South are leaning into R&B, while Fargo North and Moorhead students are more about Pop music. What’s shaping those tastes? For Moorhead and Fargo South High Schools, social media led the way. For Davies and Fargo South High Schools, it was friends. Basically: your feed and your friend group both matter.

We heard from 202 students overall and most were freshmen (35.1%). Seniors? Not so much (11.9%).

So what does this all mean? All these percentages and artist names might look scattered, but that’s exactly where sociology does its best work. What seems random isn’t random at all—it's patterned, shaped, and meaningful. By asking the right questions and applying theory, sociologists turn messy, disconnected data into real insight.

And even from these early findings, one thing is clear: musical taste isn’t universal—it’s personal, shaped by your environment, and always evolving. It might not sound groundbreaking at first, but that’s the point. Sociology uncovers the patterns we overlook and shows why they matter—and that’s where it gets exciting.